Sam Ashby will discuss his research towards a new film project, developed as part of the We Are Here residency programme. This illustrated presentation will form an incomplete history of aversion therapy and, along with curator and writer Omar Kholeif, Ashby will examine it’s connection to science fiction.

Omar Kholeif (EGYPT/UK) is a curator, writer, editor and sometime producer. A specialist in contemporary artist film, video and emerging technology, his work also boasts a focus on contemporary cultural practice within the broader intersections of North Africa and the Middle East. His writing appears in The Guardian, Art Monthly, Wired, Film International, Frieze and Artforum International, as well as in numerous catalogue and book contributions. Omar holds degrees from the University of Glasgow, Screen Academy Scotland, The Royal College of Art, London, and a PhD candidate at the University of Reading.
Omar was Curator at FACT (Foundation for Art and Creative Technology), Liverpool, the UK’s leading centre for the support, commission and exhibition of artist film, video and new media. Since 2010, Kholeif has also been a Curator at Cornerhouse, Manchester’s international art and film organisation and HOME Manchester, as well as Artistic Director at the Arab British Centre, London.
He is founding Director of the UK’s Arab Film Festival. Formerly, he was a co-curator for Abandon Normal Devices and the Liverpool Biennial of Contemporary Art, where he was a co-curator for the 2012 edition.
Kholeif is Senior Editor of Ibraaz, the leading critical forum for visual culture in North Africa and the Middle East. He was also a co-founding editor of Portal 9: Stories and Critical Writing About the City — a Beirut-based semi-annual focusing on urbanism and architecture.
Kholeif has curated projects and events, which have occurred at the The International Film Festival Rotterdam; ICA, London; Tate Modern, London; ‘Beirut’ in Cairo; Rhizome at the New Museum, New York; Arnolfini, Bristol and Art Dubai, to name but a few. He has also lectured internationally in the likes of Munich, Boston, London, Cairo, Alexandria, Sharjah, New York, and Los Angeles.
From December 2012 – January 2014, Kholeif headed up Art & Technology at SPACE, where he was curator and director of The White Building, London’s centre for art and technology.
In December 2013, Kholeif was appointed as Curator at The Whitechapel Gallery, London.
Omar is a Churchill Fellow, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, a juror for the 2013 Film London Jarman Award and a member of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA).
Omar Kholeif’s books include, Vision, Memory and Media (Liverpool University Press 2010), Far and Wide: Nam June Paik (Leonardo 2013) and You Are Here: Art after the Internet (Cornerhouse Books, 2014).
He can be reached through his site www.everythingok.co.uk.